


Under the Covers For the Day

by GalaxyGhosty



Series: It Started With the Rain [12]
Category: JackSepticEye (YouTube RPF), Markiplier (YouTube RPF), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Fluff, M/M, Sick Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-09
Updated: 2016-07-09
Packaged: 2018-07-22 11:26:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7435747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GalaxyGhosty/pseuds/GalaxyGhosty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU. Jack is sick and Mark's just not having it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Under the Covers For the Day

**Author's Note:**

> i cry it's been so long that i had to look at old parts to remember the style
> 
> Anyway! As you guys know, I've been writing a lot recently with my partner in crime, septicrier (Quintessentia) on our multichapter piece _Blessed With a Curse_. But over on Tumblr, she and I are hosting the Sunshine Challenge together and the first prompt was **Cookies**. You can see all the details over [ here](http://sunshine-project.tumblr.com). We'd love to have you participate! The rules and FAQ can be found on the blog. Next week's prompt will be going up on July 9! 
> 
> This piece works for both this series and for the project, so I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone. I'm sorry it's taken me so long to come back to this. I won't make any promises but here's hoping the next part won't be...too long. 
> 
> Someone else might be coming in, so that'll be fun! :) 
> 
> Anyway, please enjoy!

Jack absolutely hated being sick.

It was always a particularly disgusting experience that resulted in him snotting way too much and being unbearably hoarse for too many days. He didn't get sick often, but when he did, it sucked so badly that Jack literally wanted nothing but death to be brought upon him in the swiftest of ways.

Normally, he could just curl into his covers and listen to music all day, or watch Netflix until it prompted him, asking if he was alright. But that was all in his college days and last year, and the year before that, and the year before that. The only glaring difference about this year was that Jack had a boyfriend who would not put up with his unhealthy ways of dealing with his absolutely not-fatal affliction. 

“You can't just lay in bed all day and will it away,” Mark had said, the moment he found out, which hadn't taken long, considering Jack had been hacking and sneezing all over everything they knew and loved. “Come on, up you get. Go take a hot shower and put some clean clothes on, and I'll call in sick today. I'm not leaving you here by yourself.”

“I'm dying,” Jack had whined, as Mark left the room. “Take care of me by killing me.”

But he had begrudgingly gotten into the shower anyway. 

Now, he was currently wrapped in blankets on the couch, the rattling of the kitchen tuned out by the sound of the television, playing reruns of Friends from eons ago that Jack still found funny. 

“Good to hear you laughing,” Mark leaned in the doorway, giving him a knowing smile. “Coming from the guy who wanted to die about thirty minutes ago.”

“I still wanna die,” Jack told him, craning his neck to look at him from his little lump on the couch. “Trust me. I think my lungs are gonna give out. My last hour is upon us.”

Mark rolled his eyes affectionately, the smile still evident on his cheeks. “Are you hearing yourself right now? I really should record this and show it to you when you're all better.”

He started to head back into the kitchen as Jack called out, “You should record me so you can see me in my final moments! It'll be all you have left when I'm _dead_.” 

Jack was answered with a resonating laugh, so annoyingly cute that he snuggled harder into his blankets, wondering if he could smother himself with the duck feathers inside the comforter. 

A little while later, Mark came out with a bowl in his hands. Setting it on the table, Jack realized it was a soup of some kind, and he stared at it with a mute interest. 

Mark grabbed the TV remote, turning the volume down as he sat next to him, gesturing at the bowl as though it were some sort of grand prize. “Okay, buttercup. Eat up.”

“Buttercup?” Jack groused, not bothering to untangle himself from his cocoon. 

“Figure of speech,” Mark soothed, as though placating a child's feelings. “Now c'mon. This is something my mom always did for me when I was sick, and it fixed me right up. Chicken and dumplings solves _everything_.”

“It can't fix my dying body,” Jack complained, pulling the blankets over his head. “I want you to bury me with this blanket, okay?”

Mark pulled the blanket off of his head, pressing a quick kiss to his forehead. “I'll do whatever you want if you eat this for me. Should I spoon-feed you?”

Without waiting for an answer, Mark picked up the bowl and put a liberal amount of the soup onto the spoon, holding it out to him. “Nyoom, nyoom. Here comes the airplane!”

Jack broke out laughing, swatting at him, but the gesture elicited a cough shortly after. He smacked at his own chest and Mark patted his back, setting the bowl back down on the table. “Easy there. I'll get you some cough medicine, okay? Have you taken any already?”

“I wouldn't have moved from our bed if you hadn't made me,” Jack replied, rubbing his throat. “So that's a no on the medicine.”

Mark stood and left the room, and Jack sighed, shaking his head. He couldn't fight off the smile that crept onto his lips, though, as though realizing for the first time how comfortable he felt. It had been years since he felt this comfortable around someone, and it had been even longer since someone had taken even the smallest bit of consideration for him in the way that Mark had been. It was incredible to him how someone he could hardly talk to in the beginning was now someone who cared for him this much. 

A few minutes later, Mark came back in with a bottle and a little cap, sitting on the edge of the table in front of him. 

“Okay, this is gonna be really nasty,” he said, pouring a bit of the contents into a cap. It looked horrendous. “But it should help.”

“Are you sure you're not doing me a mercy and killing me with that?” Jack asked. “Because that's what it looks like. Liquid death.” 

Mark extended the cap out to him, a brow raised in such a fashion that was an evident command: _drink_. Rolling his eyes in turn, Jack took it, raising it to his lips before doing a mental countdown.

He tossed it back.

Immediately, he almost gagged it up. Never in his life had he drank something more horrible than what just went down his throat. “Okay, now I'm _really_ dying.”

“Soup,” Mark chirped, giving his hair a playful tousle before heading back into the kitchen.

Jack ate it—begrudgingly—but only to get the taste out of his mouth. 

Some time later, the scent of sweetness and home filled his lungs, and Jack turned down the volume of the TV. He tried to tilt his head into the kitchen, but couldn't manage to see around the doorway. He piped up, “Mark?” 

He received no answer, and wrapping his blankets around him like a shield, he stood up on shaky feet. Jack almost sat back down in an attempt to keep from being dizzy, but instead he soldiered on into the kitchen.

Poking his head in, he murmured, “Mark?”

Mark turned around, almost as though startled by his entrance. Jack would be too, considering how much he had just complained about dying. Movement seemed off the list. “Oh hey. Sorry, I didn't hear you. Did you need something?”

“Just wondering where you were,” Jack answered, fixing him with a look. “What are you doing?”

“Oh, nothing big,” Mark said, stepping towards him. He put a hand on his shoulder, spinning him around as gently as he can before patting him out of the room. “I'll be back in there in a second.” 

Jack wanted to rebuttal that statement and claim in a second, he would still be walking back into the living room, but he didn't have the chance. He made his way back to his little spot on the couch, once again becoming the lumpy potato now watching children's cartoons because he wanted to relive his childhood and pretend like death wasn't coming for him in the form of conglomerate snot and bad tasting medicine. 

A second, then two seconds, then a whole mess of seconds passed, and Mark still hadn't reappeared, confirming Jack's suspicions that his boyfriend was doing something he didn't want Jack to see. But with the warmth spreading throughout him, the chicken and dumplings settling into his stomach, fatigue was overcoming him.

He closed his eyes, breathing in and out of his mouth as well as he could, considering his nose was stopped up. Jack didn't quite fall asleep, but he could feel himself slipping in and out of what could be described as a comatose state. He only awoke to the creaking of the floor, and Mark rubbing his back gently. 

“You look tired, sweetheart,” Mark said, as though it wasn't already glaringly obvious. “Here, let's get you back up to bed. My surprise can wait.”

“What's the surprise?” Jack slurred sleepily, leaning into him. “You said a second like, thirty years ago.”

“Ten minutes ago,” Mark corrected. “And it can wait. You look like a breeze would blow you over.”

Jack thought about rebutting that, too, but found that he much would rather just stay glued to the side of his boyfriend than go back up to bed. 

“I just wanna stay here with you,” he closed his eyes, sniffling. “Don't move me.”

Mark put an arm around him, letting out a soft sigh, perhaps in exasperation, but maybe in endearment as well. 

“Sorry if I get you sick,” Jack said, and it was the last conscious thing he managed to get out before falling asleep. 

~~

When he woke, all the lights in the living room were out and it was quiet. 

Shucking off the blanket, Jack slowly rose from his spot, putting out his arms to balance himself before making his way into the kitchen. He smoothed his hand along the wall before finally flicking on the light switch. 

The diluted scent of cookies greeted him before he saw them, but nonetheless the sight of them stacked in a neat little pile on a plate was wonderful to see. Without thinking of his illness, he grabbed one and popped it into his mouth, taking a good chunk out of it. He polished it off with no trouble at all, before grabbing another one. 

His hunger had been unknown to him until he took the first bite, but he was starving. Cookies weren't the best meal, but they were readily accessible and, glancing at the clock above the stove, it had been hours since he'd eaten the soup Mark had given him. It filled him up, and the chocolate sticking to his teeth was a reminder that even if he was sick, there were still some things left to be enjoyed.

“You're gonna make yourself even sicker, you know.”

Turning around, Jack leaned against the counter licking his lips as he pulled the half-eaten cookie out of his mouth. “I was hungry.”

“To think it took me a good half hour to convince you to eat my soup,” Mark drawled, “and you'll eat cookies without so much as asking if they were for something else.”

For a moment, Jack thought he might actually be upset, but the slight curl of his lips indicated otherwise. He offered him a half-hearted shrug in return. “If I'm gonna die, I wanna die with a piece of heaven in me.” 

“Glad you think so highly of my baking abilities,” Mark said. “Way to ruin my surprise. I wanted to offer a couple to you as a pick-me-up, and perhaps an apology for that awful medicine, but it seems you've already helped yourself.” 

Jack gave him a smile, finding that a laugh bubbled out of him with ease. A cough followed shortly after, and he covered his mouth. “I think I just spit chocolate everywhere.”

“That's disgusting,” Mark commented, walking across the length of the kitchen to kiss him on the head, pushing the plate of cookies farther away on the counter. “No more cookies for you until you're better.”

“You're gonna get sick if you keep kissing me,” Jack murmured, letting Mark push him away from the counter and towards the hallway. 

“A price I'm willing to pay,” Mark replied, and Jack laughed as he guided him upstairs.

**Author's Note:**

> All comments, kudos, and kind words mean the world to me, thank you so much. Your patience has been wonderful and I wouldn't be here writing today if it wasn't for all of you. So stay awesome, friends! :D


End file.
